I am Director of Entitlement and Budget Policy for the Heartland Institute, Senior Advisor for Entitlement Reform and Budget Policy at the National Tax Limitation Foundation, General Counsel for the American Civil Rights Union, and Senior Fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis. I served in the White House Office of Policy Development under President Reagan, and as Associate Deputy Attorney General of the United States under President George H.W. Bush. I am a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, and the author most recently of America's Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb (New York: Harper Collins, 2011).
I write about new, cutting edge ideas regarding public policy, particularly concerning economics.

The Worst Five Years Since the Great Depression

In February, 2009, I wrote for the Wall Street Journal an article entitled Reaganomics versus Obamanomics. The article explained that the emerging Obamanomics was pursuing exactly the opposite of every policy of the enormously successful Reaganomics, and predicted that it would produce exactly the opposite results.

Well, the results are in, and under President Obama the American people have now suffered the worst 5 years since the Great Depression, as first explained by Steve McCann of the American Thinker on January 25. McCann writes,

“From 2009 through 2012, the Obama cabal, and their allegiance to statist policies, has been in charge for four years. The global financial crisis took place in the previous year, 2008 [remember the Democrat majority Congress was elected in 2006], and based on the historical pattern of American economic recovery since the depression years, the United States should have been experiencing broad and significant economic and job growth by year three at the latest.”

Instead what America got by year five was fewer jobs than before. Even though the employment age population has increased by nearly 12 million since January, 2008, there are now 3 million fewer Americans working, with employment declining from 146.3 million in January, 2008 to 143.3 million in December, 2012. If America enjoyed the same labor force participation rate as in 2008, the unemployment rate in December, 2012 would have been 11.4%, compared to 4.9% in December, 2007, under President George Bush and his “failed” economic policies of the past. We won’t see 4.9% unemployment in America again until the statest takeover of America is purged.

As I have previously recounted here, before this latest spooky downturn, since the Great Depression recessions in America have lasted an average of 10 months, with the longest previously at 16 months. The latest recession began in December, 2007. Yet here we are 62 months after the recession began, and there is hardly any recovery at all.

I have explained in previous columns that the financial crisis was caused by government, not Wall Street, which was just another victim of bad government policies. Those policies began in 1995 with President Clinton and his Executive Branch, regulatory, National Home Ownership Strategy, which was to sold as a program to expand home ownership without costing the taxpayers a dime. The regulations imposed under that strategy effectively looted the banks by trashing traditional lending standards, in the name of “fairness” of course (can’t exclude those not creditworthy from home ownership). That is how the subprime mortgage market exploded from 5% of all mortgages in 1994 to half of all mortgages by 2007.

President Bush exacerbated the problem, further pumping up the housing bubble with his cheap dollar monetary policy, under the illogical, outdated, Keynesian thinking that a cheap dollar expands the economy by promoting exports. These real causes of the financial crisis have now been well documented, in such books as The Great American Bank Robbery, by Paul Sperry, Reckless Endangerment, by New York Times reporter Gretchen Morgenson, Getting Off Track, by Stanford Economics Professor John Taylor, The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure: Why Pure Capitalism is the World Economy’s Only Hope, by Cato Institute President John Allison, and Bad History, Worse Policy: How A False Narrative About the Financial Crisis Led to the Dodd-Frank Act, by Peter Wallison, Senior Fellow for Financial Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

The National Bureau of Economic Research officially scored the recession as ending in June, 2009, still the longest recession since the Great Depression at 18 months. President Obama’s responsibility was to adopt the pro-growth policies that would generate a timely, robust recovery. But he has consistently followed the opposite, anti-growth policies, producing the worst recovery since the Great Depression, as economist John Lott originally noted.

No, Obama apologists can’t say the recovery has been so bad because the recession was so bad, as the American historical experience is the worse the recession the stronger the recovery. Obama was poised to be a national hero given his perfect timing, with the typical post recession boom starting in his first year. Obama and his people were expecting to ride that glory, with their statements regarding a supposed recovery summer in 2010, and Obama himself saying on national TV in 2009 that if he didn’t get the recovery going within 3 years, he would be a one term President. They knew the history.

And, no, you can’t say this time was different because it was a “financial crisis.” Every recession involves a financial crisis, and still the worse the recession the stronger the recovery. That financial crisis excuse is just boob bait propaganda for the gullible. Every other recession and recovery in America since the Great Depression has followed the above described patterns. But not this time, because Obama was busy transforming America from the most prosperous nation in the history of the world, into another banana republic.

That is why last month, 61 months after the recession began, unemployment was still rising, even while record numbers continued to drop out of the work force. The unemployment rate for blacks was still well into double digits at 13.8%, for Hispanics still nearly double digits at 9.7%, for teenagers, continued depression at 23.4%, for black teenagers, a genocidal 37.8%. The official U6 unemployment rate, counting those who were working part time because they couldn’t find full time work, and those marginally attached to the work force who wanted and were available for work for up to a year, was 14.4%.

Obama constantly proclaims himself the champion of the middle class. But that is just more Saul Alinsky strategy, enact socialism while proclaiming you are doing it for the middle class (which is actually getting taken). During the last 5 years, real median household income has declined nearly 9%, from $54,489 at the end of 2007, to $50,020 at the beginning of 2012. That was the most precipitous plunge on record, with a greater fall after the recession ended than before, which is unprecedented in American history. McCann adds, “While American incomes were rapidly eroding, the cost of living continued to rise as the commodity price index (basket of food, fuel and other essential commodities) rose 20% from December 2007 until September, 2012.”

We know Obama loves the poor, because he has created so many of them. Poverty has soared under Obama, with the number of Americans in poverty increasing to the highest level in the more than 50 years that the Census Bureau has been tracking poverty. Over the last 5 years, the number in poverty has increased by nearly 31%, to 49.7 million, with the poverty rate climbing by over 30% to 16.1%. Obama has also been the food stamp President, with the number on food stamps increasing during his Administration to an all time record high of 47.7 million, up 80% over the past 5 years.

This is all because there has been no real economic growth under President Obama, even though America was coming out of the recession in his first year, and so economic growth should have been higher than normal. Economic growth is the foundation for job creation, and is far more beneficial than redistribution for the middle class and the poor, who will never gain when there is a shrinking pie. Over the last 5 years, the economy has grown at an average annual rate of 0.6%, less than one fifth the long term American growth rate.

Sure there was a recession in 2008-2009. But the economy is supposed to come booming out of the downturns, averaging back out to the long-term American growth rate. But that hasn’t happened under Obamanomics. That is the core failure of President Obama.

Instead, in the fourth quarter of 2012, 5 years after the recession started, the economy was contracting again, with negative growth. One more quarter of that, and we will be back in recession, with the Fed already laying the groundwork for worse after that. The supposedly progressive Obama is leading us back into an historical reenactment of the 1930s.

Yet, while the economy has not been growing, government spending has been booming. Federal spending has increased by 41% over the last 5 years, with total government spending at all levels increasing by nearly 27%, to an all-time high of $6.2 trillion. The Democrat party controlled press told us the economy contracted in the fourth quarter because of government spending cuts. But there have been no government spending cuts. The government in the fourth quarter was spending more than ever before in world history.

Finally, despite all of President Obama’s prattle about inequality, inequality is actually worsening under his Administration. Obama said in his second inaugural address, “our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it.”

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Yes The worst years have produced a stock market rebound, a resurgent energy sector, a repairing of bank and other financial institutions’ balance sheets, and a re-balancing of the trade environment.

The writer is a partisan hack whose knowledge of economics is overshadowed by his hatred for the president. Or did he miss the part about the S&P hitting new highs while Apple’s only problem is having too much money.

I guess you failed to read the part where he explains that, counting workforce dropouts, the unemployment rate is almost 12%, or that the number of people in poverty is at its highest point in 50 years, and that Obama’s admin has set the record for number of Americans relying on food stamps? Or maybe you glossed over the part that talks about how the economic growth has been negligible and the economy has, in fact, started to contract again? Or maybe you missed where he shows that income inequality has risen every year Obama has been in office?

Or maybe you’re a crony capitalist just like Obama and only care for big corporations that support his agenda or can give him campaign dollars, hence your fixation on the stock market and the banking industry.

He also fails to take into consideration the contraction of public-sector employment at the local, state, and even federal level that has occurred over the last 4 years that is the primary cause of steady unemployment numbers: For every 2 new jobs created by the private sector, the governments of these United States are eliminating 1 old job.

10% income tax on any type of income (individual, business, corporate, capital gains, etc.) with first $30,000 exempt per individual – no other deductions beyond business expenses., i.e. married couples (gay or straight) would exempt $60,000 – no marriage discrimination.

10% national sales tax with every tax filer getting up to $3,000 check from gov’t to exempt up to 1st $30,000 (based on previous year filed taxed return). The unreported cash economy is huge!

10% net worth tax on individual assets above $1.1 billion including charities owned/controlled by an individual (they build themselves buildings and put their art collections in them with lavish perks for themselves.) Now that is progressive! So Bill Gates has personal NW of $54 billion plus controls his charity of $25 billion, so he would owe a tax of $7.9 billion on his $79 billion. Every year until he gets to $1.1 billion! Warren Buffet said that once you reach $500 million in NW there is pretty much nothing you can’t buy. With the exemption of $1.1 billion Bill Gates and the like will still have plenty of NW left to rule the world! Think of it like property taxes on your house.

Even if your tax changes made sense, they would never pass. One of the best perks for existing members of Congress is the ability to shake down the wealthy and special interest groups for campaign donations. Tax favors in exchange for campaign donations.

Partisan hack is right… All of his key points are indexed on a five-year comparison. As though somehow the President is responsible for 2008 as well, when he wasn’t in office? Why does he do this? His arguments completely fall apart if he starts his comparisons on January 20, 2009. Typical right-wing drivel.

Facts won’t phase the willfully ignorant, but the proof of Obama’s success is in the durability of our economy as compared to other economies that have gone down the austerity route. We’re holding strong with improving employment numbers, despite severe cutbacks in government employment pushed through by Republican-led statehouses and Congress.

Thank you, sir. I came to the comments section with precisely the words “partisan hack” in mind. The author clearly does not understand the causes of the subprime mortgage crisis (something I began studying in late 2006), nor the depth of and real structural challenges of the Great Recession. He treats it like some little dip as many past recessions were in comparison and blames the president as if he can control congress.

Austerity is a condition when nobody will purchase your government’s bonds. Countries are then forced to reduce their outstanding liabilities in order to borrow again. This is accomplished by cutting current expenditures and raising taxes.

“We’re holding strong with improving employment numbers”? The liberal’s unemployment numbers are failing to count those who have giving up on looking for work. Let’s be fair and include those who gave up on a job. They deserve to recognized, don’t you think?

The perfect storm has finally hit. The economy is trapped. In point of fact, we have now arrived at the point at which liberal Republicans can now be accused of betraying their base. Many of us have fumed at the Bush family and their northeastern cousins for many decades. We were crushed when Mr. Reagan chose Bush as his running mate back in 1980. The liberal wing was desperate to keep their Ivy League battalions in the game…and they succeeded. The rest is history: no effective voice raised against statist liberalism with it claims of moral superiority. And since liberal Republicans were very happy to go along with every gay/feminist/education/civil rights/environmentalist/immigration enthusiast initiative to come through hallowed halls of academia or congress, the present situation could have been predicted. To whit, we now have a demoralized conservative voter base that no longer trusts Republicans to carry out any legislation that is in its (white, middle class) interests, or even be capable of articulating those interests, vigorously defending them in the face of a hostile media, and successfully defending a conservative social and fiscal policy in the halls of congress. I’ve known many wealthy Republicans in my life, and I have never met a single one of them who could hold his own with an articulate member of the media class. Republicans, to a man, are like the ancient Spartans about whom the Athenianss used to mock as the plodding, ignorant farmer/soldiers who knew little or nothing about art and history, and who could be easily depended upon to grown sullen or angry, but who would never step outside their comfort zone. The Republican party is on the cusp of becoming irrelevant. Without the fire of the social issues to get their voter base on its feet, pray, what arcane statistics and feel-good suicidal bromides about immigration do these country club dopes propose as a way of creating excitement among potential voters. Less than half the eligible voters showed up in 2012. Most of those were whites who had no reason to think the Republican party would offer them any more than the Bush family had. We’re demoralized, and we’re going to stay that way until we get a candidate with fire in his belly and lightning flashing from his eyes who articulate bot the social and fiscal case against a degenerate statist class of politicians supported by an equally degenerate media. Who is that candidate?

You racist, hate filled bastard. You talk of social issue betrayal by “liberal” republicans. So what you are saying is… you hate gays, you want women to be subordinate to your uppity ass, if I might get down and dirty, and you think only whites should control this country. Pathetic!!

This is one of the most ignorant articles I have seen on the state of the US economy. Either the author is ignorant or a Republican. Or maybe both. George W. Bush and Alan Greeenspan are much more responsible than Obama for the state of the US economy. There are huge structural imbalances in our econonomy that have been building for decades. It is going to take a few more years to wring these imbalances out.

It never ceases to amaze me that liberals will make inane comments like, “George W. Bush and Alan Greenspan are much more responsible than Obama for the state of the economy”, “building for decades”, and “a few more years to wring these imbalances out”, yet when Bush was in office these same folks thought there was no way Bill Clinton had anything to do with any economic downturn. How is it that liberal policies only effect the here and now, yet conservative policies (those liberals see as negative) last for decades?

Thanks Peter. Nice piece. Those of us with a life are focusing on progrowth economics and are working around the current administration, it’s regulations and wasted showmanship. They don’t exist to us. Were already in post 2016 mode. Why wait? In my world of cash only and no taxes, this President is nothing more than a fly on an elephants ass. Money is pouring in the cash only economy. Were trading professional services and using the American dollar to lift our selves to new levels of wealth while the government schooled haters wallow in protectionist swill. It’s got to be really painful waiting for the big payoff from this impostour.

The question is not whether Mr. Ferrara’s analysis is correct—it is. The question is how the American electorate—even by November, 2012—could not see its truth. Apparently, the spoils system works even as anti-growth policies send the economy down the drain—as long as our glorious leader can borrow spoils to distribute to special interests. What does it say about our educational system that a majority of the electorate is willing to follow a leader whose policy is “après moi, le deluge”?

This writer has the idea that things are just going to go back to the way they were, but that’s not going to happen. The way things have been the past 30 years cannot be sustained. We had been living beyond our means financing the appearance of prosperity by borrowing from abroad, and I’m not just talking about government, but consumers and businesses. In addition to borrowing the finance irresponsible spending we’ve been selling off assets to the point where even Budweiser is foreign owned.

The fact is that things are changing. With the baby boomers imminent retirement on top of our debt, we are just not going to be living in the same prosperity. People like Peter Ferrara are unable to understand this and will just blame the incumbent, but this is a fact.

It’s TRULY unfortunate that so many are desperately and passionately invested in their personal politics that they can’t see the forest for the trees. The energy situation this country is facing has become severe with numerous failed companies benefiting from government hand-outs while real, existing energy policies have been vigorously attacked, excessively regulated and all but discouraged. We’re paying more for energy (consistently) than we have ever done before. Apparently nothing is being done to change that by this administration. The jobless numbers continue to grow while countless discouraged people drop off the unemployment rolls. Government growth continues to bloom like a cancerous weed while the public and private business sector are being told we need to dig deeper and it’s the rich’s fault for everything. What I wonder is how long will those who vigorously and naively deny that this administration is doing anything negative continue to do so? What MORE evidence is needed? Consider this. WHY is it OK for government to consistently drastically overspend far beyond the incoming funds for the budget AND YET it’s not OK for private citizens and businesses to do so? What possible justification can we really have for imposing ever-larger crippling debt on future generations? BOTH parties have predominantly abandoned virtuous, principled manners and time-tested principles of government when it comes to running the lives and livelihoods of countless millions. If the political parties REALLY cares about their constituents, they’d follow this SIMPLE rule: Do to others what you would have them do to you. Follow the constitution, use common sense, spend what you make but no more than that except in dire emergencies and keep governmental spending tightly under control. Sadly, far too many have been fooled into thinking that more and more free this and that can be had with little or no real ‘cost’ involved. The problem with socialism is sooner or later, you run out of other people’s money. How large SHOULD WE allow the federal deficit to grow? 15 trillion? 30? How about 120? At the rate we’re going, sooner or later our creditors WILL decide that like a dying drug addict, we need to be cut off to be saved. Just imagine how much worse a REAL depression will be today compared to the last ‘great’ depression…

Conservatives like Charles Krauthammer, simply do not understand our monetary and banking system.

When a law gives the authority and power to issue the nation’s currency to a group of individuals and corporations, money that everyone — including individuals, corporations, local, state and federal governments — must borrow into existence and pay tribute in the form of interest, that group will become inordinately rich and powerful, to the point of threatening the democracy itself.

Loans currently total $58.1 trillion and this year’s interest payment is $3.66 trillion. The total interest payments will be at least $33.1 trillion (3.31 X 10 = 33.1) in the next decade, and to $73.2 trillion in the next twenty years, or the financial system will collapse from a lack of currency. So in addition to generating enough borrowing to maintaining a circulating currency, the Federal Reserve System must generate almost $75 trillion in new loans just to pay the interest on old.

The Constitutionality of that law, the Federal Reserve act of 1913, has never been challenged in court. But now is the time.

Because the constitution expressly grants the enumerated power to coin money and regulate its value to Congress, it prohibits individual states from issuing their own currencies, it does not contain any provision for transferring that authority to a private for-profit banking syndicate, and transferring the sovereign authority of the United States to a private enterprise is beyond the authority of Congress, there is no clear constitutional grounds for the establishment of the Federal Reserve System, granting a privately owned syndicate the power to issue legal tender currency. The Federal Reserve System is a privately owned conglomerate, consisting of commercial banks owning stock in the twelve regional reserve banks, the twelve regional reserve banks owning all of the stock in the Central Reserve Bank in Washington.

“Yes, The worst years have produced a stock market rebound, a resurgent energy sector, a repairing of bank and other financial institutions’ balance sheets, and a re-balancing of the trade environment” – Ch Hoffman

The “stock market rebound” is directly tied to the devaluation of our dollar and nothing else: http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?s%5B1%5D%5Bid%5D=AMBNS

Goes to show you the power of Prayer! Jimmy Carter prayed everyday: Oh Father, please don’t let me die knowing I was the worst President of the United States to ever hold office! And his prayers were answered.

Heretofore and or whats more is,is as there are Jobs that can be created across the country but what I see is as this, they don’t have the Idea in Mind that I see. Not only would this be a new Idea but also an ongoing.

we can fight over politics all we want, but the bottom-line is that we’ve underspent for over 40 years in rebuilding our infrastructure, education and repairing health care all at the expense of tax cuts. Tax cuts alone do not provide stimulus for future growth, there is no Return on Investment (ROI) in consumerism. Baby Boomers have been easily the most selfish, greedy, and lazy generation this country has ever seen. They continue to support an education system that was designed in 1930s, can’t finance repair of bridges, still using 1800 rail technology, refuses to upgraded air traffic …etc. etc. etc. Now, they will continue to support the same failed policies from both parties until the country is on its knees, begging for a new start.

I agree on infrastructure, but disagree on the rest. Healthcare is no way an investment nor is education that is just wasted on too many college graduates with poor majors and many who don’t ever graduate. Perhaps if we did not waste so much money on our friends companies and taxed fuel more we could improve our infrastructure and save a lot of gas.

No we overspent in the last 40 years and gave most of it to men like Mr. Ferrera and his corrupt casino buddies. Wall Street is addicted to money and is extraction all it can from the economy and not producing any returns.

If you hate the poor so much and especially hate subsidizing their existence, tell your Republican friends to encourage the poor not to have children they can’t afford to support without massive government handouts. Instead of trying to shut down abortion clinics, they should be encouraging Planned Parenthood to build new ones. Think of how much money the country could save if young unmarried women or teenagers in public housing projects and Section 8 housing were paid not to have more than two children.

Why do Republicans hate subsidizing American poor people but have no trouble supporting foreign aid to Israel? The defense dollars that Israel gets from the US free up other dollars (actually, sheckels) for the government of Israel to spend on its own welfare recipients, especially the Haredi, who do not practice family planning and think everyone else owes them a living.

Personally, these are not my five worst financial years, not even close. I’d have to go back over 50 years and even in the late 1950′s, I lived better than many people did during the Great Depression.

Why would someone consistently defend indefensible fiscal policies that are anathema to private citizens and private industry? Why would someone think it’s OK for our government to continue to grow uncontrollably while calling for us to spend more and more of our hard-earned money on their dangerous fiscal habit? I guess common sense REALLY ISN’T so common. Both parties are MUCH more interested in what’s in it for them rather than what’s REALLY important for us. Compare their healthcare plan to ours, I dare you.

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An op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page (though often mistaken for opinion-editorial), is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper’s editorial board.

Since 2008 we are in a second Great Depression (GDII). Government drove the housing bubble, however so did Wall Street. Using bad math Wall Street justified unsustainable risks in their lust for money. They then put the burden for their mistakes on the backs of all Americans instead of being put in jail for their lies and theft.

I am no fan of Obama, but I have learned that the GOP is largely to blame for where we are today. The regulations, put in place following the first Great Depression, that protected Americans from Wall Street shenanigans were stripped away by each Republican administration that followed Jimmy Carter.

The reality is that both parties are to blame, and so is Wall street, and the “banks” (more like gambling houses). Jimmy Carter began the process of requiring loans to be given to those who could not afford them, Wall Street cooked the books to cover up the enormous risk, and the Republicans took away the regulations that would have prevented it all from happening.

Fast forward to today and neither party has a workable solution. The GOP would have us saddle ourselves with European style austerity programs while permitting plutocrats to get a free ride on taxes. Obama and the Dems continue with Keynesian economics that can work OK in the short term but long term creates an unmanageable debt.

All this while even greater economic destruction awaits that is so terrible nobody dares speak of it. Derivatives! Not just mortgages. The world’s debt is now in the form of derivatives and worth multiple times the entire world’s GDP. However, as we learned from the mortgage derivative meltdown (or did we learn anything), they are not worth what they are advertised. They will implode eventually and take the entire world’s finance system and economy down with them. For that we can thank Wall Street and their political benefactors.

kovalb, Your comment is a good illustration of the most fundamental problem today. Too many Americans are not capable of self-government. The article explains the causes of the financial crisis. It was not deregulation, it was overregulation, and the Fed’s cheap dollar monetary policy. Wall Street had nothing to do with it actually. What law would you convict them of violating? Or do you want to just grab them and imprison or even behead them French Revolution style? They were victims just as much as you were. The Fed’s negative real interest rates for 5 years paid Wall Street to overleverage and take on excessive risk. Derivatives had exactly zero to do with it. I gave you 6 books to read. Start reading if you want to be able to discuss the issue intelligently. A complete program to get the economy booming was explained in my own 2011 book, America’s Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb. The program is the opposite of austerity and has been proven to work in the real world across the globe, and throughout history, whereever it has been tried. Keynesian economics has been proven so wrong that advocacy or teaching of it should be outlawed.

How can you say Wall Street had nothing to do with it? They had everything to do with it. Have you forgotten about Credit Default Swaps? Writing articles like this one is as irresponsible as these quasi investment vehicles. It’s malpractice. People like you should put the politics aside and do a critical assessment instead of “Obama bad” revisionist history. You only throw out figures which support your arguement and ignoring others which do not. We only see one side, not the whole picture. You would not last a day in any respectable position.

Don’t know why you are saying Carter began the process of requiring loans to those who could not afford them. That’s demonstrably false. There never was any governmental law, policy, regulation, etc that required loans to be given to people who could not afford them.

Republicanists needed a scapegoat for the housing bubble collapse that was caused almost wholly by shady mortgage policies by investment banks. Who better to blame than the poor, right? It’s part of the Republicanists’ policy platform to never accept blame and to deflect at all cost (just see the ignorant author of this hit piece).

It’s a fact that CRA loans had a much lower rate of foreclosure than non-CRA subprime mortgages. It’s a fact that 9 out of the top 10 subprime lenders weren’t CRA enforced entities. Only 6% of subprime loans were CRA-covered.

These are the facts. You are entitled to your own opinions (and lord knows the Republicanists feel entitled to show their ignorance in full force without remorse), but you aren’t entitled to your own facts.

Peter, spot on article. However, your comment above regarding the teaching of Keynesian economics needing to be outlawed is a little flawed. In first place, such outlawing would violate the first amendment, but more importantly, it needs to be taught and shown to be the failure that it is through example, lest any brilliant individual in the future “discover” the same and influence another unwitting generation. I’m assuming your statement was just hyperbole.

Doc Lee, that “It’s a fact that CRA loans had a much lower rate of foreclosure than non-CRA subprime mortgages” may or may not be true. I don’t know. However, CRA loans were nurtured more by government regulation than non-CRA subprimes. But more importantly, the taxpayer funded backing of subprimes for large amounts by GSEs Fannie and Freddie together with lax lending standards enabled and fueled irresponsible lending by many Banks and Mortgage companies. Once the pool of “mortgage eligible” borrowers was greatly expanded, market forces naturally created the housing price bubble.

I call BS on your post. If we did not deregulate the banks we would not have had to use taxpayer money to bail so many of them out – the same banks who caused the problems in the first place. If we did not deregulate them, they would not have been too big to fail and they would not have been able to hold the country hostage to their recklessness.

Obama did not sign a single pink slip. That was all the free choice of CEO’s who opted to kick workers to the curb rather than see reduced profits. And the pink slips were handed out by jellyfish middle managers and supervisors who didn’t have the guts to say “no.”

“Facing the risks of the marketplace.” What a joke. Show me a single CEO or senior officer who’s had any kind of impact on his lifestyle from the recession. They pass all the risks on to their workers.

Peter, Please do not confuse all of the liberal oh I am sorry progressive Democrats out there with the salient facts. Do you not know that not enough stimulus money has been issued to create a roaring, robust economy? Obama just needs more time and money to accomplish this. Hell, I think he even needs a third term as the great F.D.R. did to push and change our country to newer, grander heights of Socialism. Kensyian economic policies do work just look at the U.K. and the rest of Europe and how they are titans of industry. and finally sir, you must be an evil, vile, mean spirited racist to dare criticize our dear, annointed leader who walks on water and according to the libs in the media “Is the most intelligent president ever” to have occupied our White House. The king has no clothes but don’t tell him that or his adoring masses.

This “article” wouldn’t pass muster in an Intro to Journalism class. Obama wasn’t even President for a year of the timeline the author is talking about, which he conveniently ignores, nor would the budget tinkering show up for a full fiscal year in any indicators. This would chop 2 years off his timeline, and force him to discuss the wonders caused by George W. Bush. He then goes on to cite his peers and OWN books as references, as though that holds the weight of fact. Laughable. It seems that Forbes is going down the same road as the WSJ. OH, and if you couldn’t beat the sitting President that allegedly presided over the worst 5 years since the Great Depression, what does that say about your ideas? Mendacious partisan hack-job.

Incredibly shallow. Mr. Ferrera has made it abundantly clear that the economy is in poor shape and has hardly been improving like we want it to. Unfortunately, the piece doesn’t go any deeper than that except to note that Barack Obama has been our president for four years. Ferrara’s writing isn’t just partisan, it is journalism at its laziest; correlation is taken for causation without a single explanation linking the two. He is putting Obama at fault for our economic woes without even mentioning a single specific policy. He does mention our insane levels of overall spending, but fails to explain how the president has contributed to government waste in any way.

The entire government needs to change. You can think of it as a broken game. You can change the players, over and over again, and the game will still be broken. You can’t fix the game by changing the players, you have to change the game. For the last several terms we, the people, have had to vote for “the lesser of two evils” in an attempt to fix a broken government by changing the politicians that are running the game. THIS OBVIOUSLY ISN’T WORKING! In order to fix the government, you have to change the government, not change the politicians. Every single person on capitol hill needs to be paid a MUCH smaller salary to begin with. Right now, the government is corrupted by the huge sums of money being paid to politicians, while the soldiers and working class support system starves to death in attempt to protect and build America. Our country has become a shadow of its former self. We are no longer great, we are mediocrity at its finest. We are supposed to be the land of the free and the home of the brave, but I don’t feel free, and I don’t see enough people that are brave enough to stand up and say: THIS IS ENOUGH. YOU [the government] WILL STOP! YOU [the government] WILL PAY FOR WHAT YOU HAVE DONE! I WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS! Stop letting big government control you, and take back control of this country. The only reason we are not free is because our “inalienable rights” have been given up, not taken away. By definition, these rights that we are giving up are INSEPARABLE, so step back and think about how you lost your rights, and how the government has gained so much power that they no longer feel the need to answer to the American People. The only way to fix the economy is to change the system controlling that economy.

Truth is the great equalizer. You talk of poverty under Reagan decreasing from 1983 onward. That is because they CHANGED the definition of poverty, ie, lowered the FPIL which defines who is poor. Also, notice you don’t even talk of how most objective analysts describe in great detail statistically how the inequity between poor and rich actually INCREASED under Reagan. And….don’t even get me started about how all of a sudden under Reagan the deficit, which was so important to the wacko right wingers like you when Carter was in office, suddenly became just a non-entity under Reagan. Quite frankly, Reagan had these nutty budget formulas which prolonged and deepened the recession that he inherited; his opposition to abortion and support for things like school prayer smacked of religious zealotry; his insensitivity to the poor and minorities was a travesty; he could never comprehend the women’s movement; and his beloved military wasted money hand over fist So PLEASE, spare me the worship of St Ronnie, you FUCK!!!

This is what happens when you talk facts to a liberal, they get upset over good logic and sound fiscal policy. The point of the article is how slow the recovery is. Stephen here can’t defend Obama’s $16.5 trillion deficit and counting, so he talks about social issues of the 80′s. Wake up Stephen, we are robbing from our children and grandchildren. People like you are socializing America and demonizing our constitution.

Why can’t Harry Reid and the Senate pass a budget? Why has every budget Obama has come up with been denied by both the house and the senate? If we go broke, no one will get anything. Get that through your head. One of our biggest debts is the interest we owe to other nations and that is unacceptable.

We are placing ourselves in grave danger by crushing the dollar bill and doing nothing to protect it. Spending more is not the answer. Entitlements are reserved for the truly needy and Obama’s policies force the majority of people to become needy on the government. Just look at the high unemployment, the growth in food stamps, the growth in welfare, rising college debt with a lack of jobs to support it, and the list goes on. These liberal policies destroyed Europe, they destroyed US states like California, and they are destroying America as a nation. No one is better off today than they were before Obama got in office. This is the result of failed policy.

I don’t believe you have the slightest understanding of the economy or fiscal policy. For starters, Obama does not have a deficit of $16.5 trillion dollars. This is the first stupid thing that betrays you’re intelligence.

The national DEBT, which has been building since we were a nation, is a little over $16.5 trillion. The debt grows because of budget DEFICITS (and some other stuff), which is when the federal govt. spends more than it brings in.

The deficit has been decreasing under Obama. If we see a little compromise on taxes and if the middle- and lower-class can improve their lot, I’d say it’s pretty reasonable that the budget and deficit will be well under control by the end of Obama’s second term. A lot of stuff has to go right, and a lot of change has to be made when it comes to fiscal policy, but it can be achieved through the acknowledgement of facts and compromise. (Now you see why top Republicans insisted on no compromise throuhgout Obama’s first term.)

There is no evidence to support the fiscal policy of slashing spending and easing taxes on the rich (the falsely titled “job creators”). Giving breaks to corporations and big business won’t grow the economy; it’s business 101- you don’t spend your money to make jobs, you spend your money when you can MAKE money. When can you make money? When there’s a DEMAND.

Both the government AND the people must demand/spend to grow the economy. This means putting money in the hands of the people who aren’t accounting for their share of spending (the middle- and lower-classes, about 95% of the population). We achieve this through actually livable wages and supportive benefits and through fair and logical taxes.

One last note, consider what happens when you put a dozen different countries, each with varying levels of economic success, on to one currency. Inflation of one economy counteracts deflation in another; booming countries experiencing inflation end up better off than should be possible while the declining countries get worse than ever. Don’t go blaming just socialist policy for the state of the Eurozone, it’s not the whole picture.

One must wonder if this is not all deleiberate. Rahm Emanuel, psychopath that he is, is the person that said that no crisis should be allowed to go to waste. Emanuel did not say that the government should go around creating crises, but that is what Obama is doing. Creating crises is a long-standing tactic of Marxists, who then offer themselves as saviors for the crises they have created, thereby allowing themselves to take control. The medium of exchange in a free econommy is money, but the medium of exchange in a Marxist system is control. Enjoy.

I have worked two of the last five years, and since the unemployment rate will soon be at 3% it makes me feel better about it, it must have been that I was too lazy to go out and get a job or, I think I must have been in a deep sleep or something. I’ll be happy to report in the future I slept through the last Depression.

And now we have up before Congress a proposal to sequester up to 300,000 good-paying white collar jobs per year by reserving them for foreign workers via work visas. Remember, when companies claim that they “couldn’t find a qualified American” it’s because no law made them look for one before promising the job to a foreigner.

Samantha. I can see what your saying… Leroy`s remark is impossible… I just purchased a great Honda NSX from earning $8465 this past four weeks and just over 10-k last-month. this is really my favourite-work Ive had. I started this 10-months ago and immediately startad bringin in minimum $84… p/h. I went to this site,, jump15.comCHECK IT OUT

The fact is that American economy is improving every year on average if compared to European one. In this case we will have a slowdown in the main stock indexes but from June 2013 on they pull back violently as I have explained inside my website: http://www.mystocktobuy.com. Kind regards, Fredrick

Strange that Europe and South Africa and … all have serious ‘recession’ problems (though the governments keep telling us it is not a recession!). Can this global phenomenon, which does not seem to have a predictable end in sight, really really have been caused by one man – and that my hero? WOW!

Economic, social and climate change answers are so simple. Take, for example, the Work Less Party is a political party in the Canadian province of British Columbia, says Wikipedia. The party was founded in 2003 by Conrad Schmidt. The primary aim of this party is to move to a 32-hour work week. The party slogan is “Work Less, Consume Less, Live More.” The slogan describes the party’s aim to encourage people to reduce their consumption, to be more environmentally and socially conscious, and to focus on real values. Instead of consuming, people are encouraged to spend time on family, friends, community engagement, art and creative endeavours, spiritual exploration, and athletic activities. The guiding principles of the Work Less Party of BC are that people should be working less, taking more time enjoying what makes them happy and spending less money on unnecessary consumer goods. To accomplish this they purpose to start by legislating a 32-hour or four-day work week. Their research has shown that by reducing the work week from five days to four would result in approximately 7% less take home pay but would also mean a much lower unemployment rate and allow workers to spend more time with family and pursuing leisure activities. Other policy points included on past platforms have included controls on rents and property costs, higher taxes on luxury goods, and the promotion of arts, education, sports and research, prohibiting unpaid overtime work, and changing to the payroll tax system to encourage hiring additional workers. There you have it: the solution.

Economics is not testable science. That is why everyone has their own theory of who is to blame and such arguments cannot be resolved. However author gives too much credit to Obama. President has only limited effect on the economy. Further more, far from being socialist, Obama is actually center-right. Third of Obama stimulus, for example, was in the form of tax cuts. The increase in spending under Obama has more to do with bad economy and increase in age of population than to anything that Obama has done. Obama did not really change welfare of entitlements in any meaningful way.

Reagan on the other hand was a huge deficit spender. It is easy to have a good life now if you borrow money to pay back in the distant future and that is what Reagan did.

Small problem here. Take out the first 6 months of his presidency, and all the statistical arguments fall apart. Obama’s policies did not take effect on 1/20/09, and after they were put in place, it would take several months for them to have an impact.

After the 6 month point, the economy has been an a steady but anemic growth path. Not perfect, but some certainly not a policy record that has “failed.”

In fact, if this were a debate class, it would be Peter Ferrara who would get an “F”

I guess that’s what happens when “truthiness” is the basis for your reasoning.

Enough with the partisan diatribes. The Depression wasn’t caused by Hoover or Roosevelt. Rail miles peaked in 1926 and a population of 15 million horses was replaced with mechanized farm equipment over a 20 year period. Early adopters made money. Late adopters collapsed due to inefficiency. Lenders to late adopters got creamed.

Look around you. Teen girls used to waste their afternoons and spend a fortune at the shopping malls. Now they spend their time on Facebook. Automobile ownership has peaked. As we make changes, programs like Taleo and Kenexa say displaced workers “lack skills” that many of them can learn faster than personnel departments could hire them. Don’t blame this nonsense on Bush and Obama.

Forbes may be a Capitalist Tool, but if you encourage solutions that leave workers involuntarily sitting on their butts, human capital is wasted. That waste means less money to spend on other people’s top lines. Don’t just maximize the share that goes to capital, maximize the whole pie.

before I saw the check which had said 4615, I didn’t believe that my mother in law had been actualy bringing home money parttime on their computer.. there friends cousin has done this for under 21 months and at present repaid the mortgage on their appartment and purchased a new Lancia Straton. this is where I went, fb26.ℂOM

I’m dumb-founded every morning when I wake up in the last four years or so… Allow me to lay out FACTS (just facts, not interested in politics).

* Came to the US on Jan 10 1990, first 10 years, I truly experienced the greatness of America, freedom and opportunity, and I was grateful for that. Around August 2010 I made $60/hour as a web application developer. It was a steady progression.

* After 911, I made a stupid but HUGE mistake in my entire life, trying to do good and be helpful but I was naive. Lost life-saving because of that… And that’s fine because that’s my own decision.

* What’s worse is that I did some web development consulting work for a remote client on and off. About four years ago I dropped the communication for I do not see any value in keeping the contact then hell all broke loose. Anything/every project I undertake would be sabotaged… Every night my LinkedIn account would have the agency’s ad showing up upon login for a period of time till several weeks ago… It’s absurd I have ZERO interest in that sort of thing. But viciously attacking me is not only illlegal but morally despicable as well. Or was it because something was unwisely revealed a while ago, which could imply relationship between the agency and someone now in high office?

Do you know how I survive last few years? Why of thousands of journalists, not a single soul????

Final note: If I’m wrong I’m willing to be corrected. But using tax dollars to attack a citizen and to make his life impossible, again is EVIL.

No you are wrong. It was, at the behest of then treasury secretary, former GS board member and Citi CEO Rubin, the repeal in 1999 of the The Glass–Steagall Act (passed by Congress in 1933) that now allowed commercial banks from speculating with full-service brokerage firms or participating in investment banking like highly leveraged CDS or credit default swaps. Bloomberg identified $638 trillion worth of swaps out there in summer of 2012 (underfunded insurance, save for the premiums they collect for em) . Those instruments are not available for trading to the public ; basically just one giant monopoly game banks play amongst themselves. I doubt there is even 1% to cover that if something goes wrong like it did in 08.Swaps like CDS are listed on usdebtclock.org.

How can we fix this mess? The value of our dollar is based on the faith and trust the world has in the productivity of the American worker. We live in two worlds. The working people which is declining and the profit driven investors. In manufacturing, services and the white collar realms people are being replaced by machines and software. On paper cutting costs looks good. The reality is they are destroying their customer base. Long term what is going on now is unsustainable. If every factory in the world replaced humans with robots which is happening right now who would be left to buy their stuff?

Ignoring any of the politics, because people in this country seem to be polar opposites when it comes to politics, the real point here is that the statistics are alarming and our economy continues to be broken. Unfortunately the Republicans can not get their head out of the arse on religious issues, definition of rape etc., and share equal blame for not focusing economy, and the Democrats want to only talk about a fiscal crisis under Bush. To be clear, the repealing of the Glass-Steagall act Led by Chris Dodd and Barney Frank during the Clinton era set a lot of the financial crisis in motion. We created banks too big to fail and allowed them to put more at risk than when they were under the Act. But hey forget pointing the fingers here, there are plenty of things to point to.

As an entrepreneur and an economist by education, it is hard to separate politics from economics but the fact of the matter is these statistics are alarming. 1-9 people 55 and older cannot find jobs they lost in the Great recession these days, their savings, equity and hope vanished as the income gap has widened and unemployment and underemployment continues in the US. We all must band together to right this economy. As Clinton once said “It’s the economy stupid!” and boy we have tweaked it into a sick state. Meanwhile China and India, once third world to us are expanding.

Thanks for the well-written piece accurately describing the state of the economy, Peter. While you’ve nailed many of the indicators that make this the worst economic downturn since the great depression, there are figures from the Department of Labor that show the employment situation to be far worse than numbers released by the BLS. Of course, those are survey-based predictive estimates, and where the surveys show results different from expected, BLS statisticians rework figures to more nearly match what was anticipated from the seven to ten day data gathering period beginning around mid-month each month. The statistically manipulated figures are then presented as Seasonally Adjusted figures, which is one more way that the survey-based data is flawed. Last fall, when figures seemed incredible and unbelievable to many outside of the BLS, that’s what John Hall, BLS Commissioner through January 2012, and Rick Manning, a former Chief of Staff at the Department of Labor, said echoing Jack Welch’s statements. Their words indicated without hesitation that the BLS system is deeply flawed.

There’s a different agency within the DOL which offers real counts for statistics that are more disturbing than what BLS figures suggest, based upon entry-level survey analysis. The Employment and Training Administration (ETA) posts real counts from employment offices administered at a state level nationwide regarding numbers of registrants for unemployment after job losses. The most significant number is the count of first-time claimants, or new registrants, filing initial claims. As of February 2, 2013, the cumulative count of first-time claimants whose jobs were slashed since Obama has been President topped 95 million. That’s right, the actual cumulative total reached 95,049,000 by the week ending February 2nd, and later today the figure will vault to well over 95.4 million.

The ETA doesn’t post cumulative figures at their site or manipulate real counts to the extent the BLS freely does, but the figure typically released each Thursday to the public is a seasonally adjusted figure, nonetheless. Summary figures can be found at the Rocky Mountain Perspective site by paging down under the Real Unemployment tab. One more critical count is kept by the ETA, which is a quarterly summary of recognizable workers paying into state Unemployment Insurance funds, according to employers’ payroll record counts. At 128,613,913, the number of verifiable workers counted by the ETA remains 5.25 million down from the number of workers in the workforce when Obama took Office back in January 2009. I’m unsure of where your 12 million figure for young come-of-age workers was drawn from, but the best available data about who’s transitioning into the workforce comes from the Digest of Education Statistics, which shows that number to be more in the 17-18 million range. And that doesn’t include dropouts who left the nation’s public schools by or before 10th grade, which is a sizable number in many major metro areas. In some, like the Los Angeles Unified School District, a majority of the LAUSD’s students won’t matriculate through to graduation.

Add to the known 17-18 million newcomers from our nation’s schools an additional 4.4 million LPR’s awarded green cards to further grow the workforce, along with 600,000 H1B visa recipients promised employment to secure that form of visa through the State Department, a range of asylees and exceptions that approach a half million over the President’s time in Office, and the growing numbers of mostly Mexican Nationals who mostly cross our Southern Border unimpeded under this Administration, and the count of new workers trying to find a place in the shrunken workforce under Obama appears to be in the 27 to 30 million range. How can anyone think the more than 7 million verifiable jobs added to the economy under George Bush who handed over a workforce of 133,886,830, which stands at 5.25 million fewer workers after a modest, halting recovery from 8.3 million jobs shed since 2009, is anything other than a hurting economy more nearly approximating a depression than an extended recession? Again, simple math suggests more than 25 million new workers on top of 5.25 million fewer jobs in the economy suggests a disturbing number of the 95 million Americans who lost jobs under the Obama regime are unlikely to find jobs anytime soon. As most should realize, recovery won’t take place until tens of millions of the nation’s unemployed are returned to gainful employment.

Since many of the prior comments continue to vilify and blame George Bush, perhaps a direct comparison from ETA counts during Bush’s second term versus real ETA employment counts for Obama’s first term might have applicability here. An inarguable 22 million more jobs lost under Obama by the end of 2012 translates into an extra 108,000 jobs lost on average across each of Obama’s 205 weeks in Office entering the new year, and months with 31 days in them showed 497,000 more jobs slashed than were lost under his predecessor as of the last month of Obama’s first term. If one considers the impact from the costliest man-made disaster to hit the U.S. back on 9-11 seven months into the Bush Presidency, the costliest natural disaster on record in Hurricane Katrina, and then the problems others have written about here with financial markets in 2008, which tanked badly after Obama’s election to reach 6,547 on March 9, 2009, the seven million jobs added to the economy under President Bush seem all the more impressive. It’s hard to tell what adjective best describes the 5.25 million fewer workers in the economy today under Obama than when he first took Office, but some on the left like to focus on the entry-level, inadequate recovery back from 8.3 million jobs lost entirely under Obama, according to ETA counts from payroll records nationwide. Suggesting this isn’t Obama’s and the Democrats economy does a disservice to Americans badly in need of real recovery. Unfortunately, those who’ve paid attention and done even modest research have little expectation that such a thing will take place under this misguided Administration. Oh well. The left can always blame George Bush. It’s apparently worked as intended so far.

As to the piece, “The Worst Five Years Since the Great Depression,” supra, much insight and foresight rises from the article. With ACTUAL unemployment rates hitting well above the “depression-requisite 10%” (i.e., including the minions of the unemployed NOT counted by Obamanomics’s unemployment figures, e.g.: laid-off workers who due to severe depression, disability, and disgust have ceased to look for gainful employment), we are in and have been in a economic crisis raising to the level of a second great depression since at least 2008! Indeed, as a trained, practicing economist and commercial law attorney, I maintain that 25+ years from now, history will teach that the period from approximately 2007 through 2014+ constituted the Great Depression II. And that is depressing beyond words to describe!

Basically the summary of the article could be summed up as: If only the government had done exactly what we (Wall Street) told you to do everything would be all better. We have been doing what Wall Street wanted since the 80s. We’ve been squeezing society at all levels to give people like Mr. Ferrara more money that is gonna rain down on us any minute now. The only reason it still continues is that the people with the money now are leveraging it to lock the power structure in place and prevent any change to the status quo. From oversight to regulation, legislation and taxation Mr Ferrera and his friends are protected. Reagan was a senile fool who paved the way for the beancounters and the idiot MBA’s (Like our 42nd President) to plunder the economy. We used to have an economy based on making things. All we do now is come up with new and inventive ways of repackaging and reselling out old debt. the best quote from Mr. Ferrera: “Too many Americans are not capable of self-government.” Yes Sir, I’ll bet he has some ideas about that too. It must be pure audacity to think that average people would know more about running their lives than the Wall Street titans. He shows the same contempt for the democratic system that you see from today’s GOP. Nothing more than another defender of a government of the rich for the rich and by the rich.

You can’t install socialism until capitalism is destroyed by spending the country into bankruptcy, increasing energy prices and taxes to depress economic growth and jobs, armed revolution, or a combination of these things.

When Obama first took office, he initially blamed the economic crisis on “capitalism”. What’s that tell you?

FORBES HAS LOST ALL CREDIBILITY. You can’t just “make things up”, which is essentially what you are doing. - The stock market is up. - Unemployment is at 7.7, and jobs are being added every month, not lost. - Housing values are rising. - Obama has raised the debt 42%, Bush raised it 89%. (yes Obama is a higher dollar value, and a soda isn’t .25 cents anymore either… nice manipulation) - We are no longer in Iraq - We are leaving Afghanistan - In 2009, school lunches began to be included as “food stamps”, why don’t you bring up that point?

The worst 5 years? that was probably 2003 to 2008 when we tried to fund two massively expensive wars with mega-tax breaks…..

Of interest here to think about, NAFTA took full effect in 2008. Since than we have steadily watched American jobs going to Mexico. Why make your products here, when you can simply ship them to Mexico, tax free and have them assembled and shipped back to us, all tax free. Try to sell the same product assembled in the U.S. to our citizens and businesses are hit with a hefty tax. HMMMMMM. Ross Perot hit the nail head on I would say, Hear that giant sucking noise, that’s jobs being sucked out of the U.S.

I am almost homeless and completely broke in spite of trying and doing all i can-really. i could have bought shoes instead of putting my efforts into failed endeavors the last 5 yrs have been hell. totally agree- but what do you do when you r the new indigent what? seriously

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Interesting perspective… How could the economy truly recover with the U.S. government’s inability or non-interest in preventing what occurred in the “Great Depression” from repeating itself as it did with the recent “Great Recession”? Recovery from the “Great Depression” (for the U.S.) was largely due to the growth in industrialization during WWII and the U.S.’s ability to out pace Europe. Post WWII … U.S. Factories were ready to produce. No real destruction of factories had occurred in the US as they had in Europe, U.S. industries had capitol and infrastructure from the war, and thus a HUGE advantage. Europe had high demand in order to recover from unprecedented destruction. Europe contributed greatly to our recovery from the “Great Depression” by purchasing our products, fueling growth, and thus jobs were created and money flowed into the U.S. economy. Globally… post WWII… “Made in USA” was seen on the majority of products requiring factory production and this lasted until 10-15 years ago. In current times and post “Great Recession” (I’m not confident that we are truly past it) China and third world nations are the manufacturing engines. Globally there has been a major shift in technology where communications and production can extend across continents. Management, consumers, manufacturers, suppliers and profiteers can extend as far as possible and huge advantages exist because of this. This change has been taking place for 10-20 years but culminates in the “Great Recession” and is the nail in the coffin to U.S recovery. Confounding the problem is that there is no advantage to manufacture in the U.S. when importing is far less expensive and far less risky than employing and producing in the U.S. With production outside it borders, the U.S. is not able to benefit from it’s consumer spending. Simply, jobs are not being produced for the largest sector of the employment pool and money flows from consumers in the U.S. to the few while labor and tech jobs are created in other countries. President Obama who has been handicapped by congress for the past 6 years is an easy scapegoat. Taking on the medical and insurance industries while fighting 2 wars and trying to recover from a massive economic reset was a strategic mistake although a noble cause. The reality is unless there is a good reason for jobs to be created in the United States, and our citizens can earn a reasonable living, the recent economic recovery based on speculation is unsustainable. The legal system, our politics, demand for high incomes, regulations, greed, and taxes work against. There has not been a good presidential candidate that could have rallied U.S. politicians and citizens to stimulate the change that is needed.

Look up and read my Forbes column entitled, “The Great Depression Was Not Ended by the Start of World War II, But By the End of It.” And also my later series of columns on how to restore booming economic growth in America. As for your comment about Presidential candidates, I am working with one right now who can do as a leader exactly what you suggest.